Sex & Sensibility

by Shannon Hollis

  “It isn’t groundless.” She touched the untidy stack of college applications. “And he wants to know everything, upsetting or not, which is why he’s letting me stay here.” She glanced at the closet. “As for this mystery person, you’ll see a change in the kind of clothes she’s buying. The things she’s bought recently—with the tags still on them—are very adult. The kind of clothes that are designed to get attention. And it’s clear she wants that attention to be male.”

  Griffin crossed the room and leaned on the wall just inside the closet, next to a rack of shoes. She moved past him and lifted the taupe jersey dress off the rail by its hanger. “Look at this one, for instance. Spaghetti straps, backless, with a built-in bra that could hold back the American River. Dolce & Gabbana’s done some serious engineering here for the purpose of capturing a man’s attention and holding it.”

  “Are you so good at knowing what holds a man’s attention?”

  “Well, I’m betting we’re talking about a man who needs youth—young body, young skin, young attitude. Who picks a girl who won’t judge him because she’s not very experienced yet. And the more I think about it, the more I wonder if you weren’t right about him and the kidnapper being the same person.” Tessa stopped, suddenly realizing what he’d asked. “Was that a personal comment?”

  “Take it however you want.”

  “What I want isn’t relevant. What you meant is.”

  She couldn’t read his expression, but there was an odd, heated light in his eyes.

  “I was just curious,” he said. “Just wanted to confirm you can’t read a man’s mind. When you’re in bed with him, for instance.”

  6

  GRIFFIN WATCHED SHOCK, then confusion, then challenge ripple across her expression. He didn’t know why he was goading her. He was supposed to be watching out for his boss’s interests, waiting for her to slip up and show herself to be a fraud.

  Unfortunately, all she was showing was a damn good grasp of human behavior and a skill at observation that was as good as his.

  Better, even. He hadn’t even thought about what sales tags meant on a woman’s clothes. What he was thinking about was what the dress on the hanger would look like on Tessa. How the smooth fabric would look against her fair skin. And what kind of spectacular results the designer’s engineering would produce if it cupped breasts like hers.

  “Of course not,” she said. “Who wants to hear a whole lot of mental grunting, anyway?”

  Stop fantasizing about her breasts, you idiot.

  “Maybe you ought to pick a different kind of guy,” he suggested. “One who thinks in sentences.”

  She turned her back on him, which, he was discovering, was how she communicated she’d been offended.

  “You know, we have to work together for however many days this takes,” she said from the other side of the room. “You might consider being civil and keeping this on a business, not a personal, level.”

  She was right. How could he fantasize about her on one level and label her a criminal on another? What kind of man did that make him?

  The truth was, he simply wasn’t ready for her to be right and for him to be wrong.

  “I know you don’t believe in me, and that’s fine,” she went on. “My sister doesn’t, either. But I do have something to contribute, and if you’ll let me do my job maybe it will make it easier for you to do yours.”

  Right again. He hated that.

  “So can we please call a truce and get on with it?”

  To remind himself he was a decent guy, he kept his gaze on her face. Her eyes were just as wide and blue as he remembered from two years ago, and the short haircut accentuated her pointed chin and terrific cheekbones. And that mouth with its full lower lip and dented upper—

  No, don’t think about her mouth, either. Besides, how could such reasonable things come out of it one minute and such nutty things the next?

  Was that his problem? He couldn’t figure out whether she was a nut, a criminal, or for real. A fair man would give her a chance to prove herself one way or another. And he prided himself on being a fair man. The way he was treating her was out of character for him—had been from the moment he’d remembered who belonged to the voice on the phone.

  He didn’t like being out of character. He was comfortable in his own skin these days and didn’t much care for anything that scratched at it—the way this woman seemed to do without even trying.

  “Okay,” he said finally. He ambled over to where she stood by Christina’s window, looking out toward the beach. “Truce it is.” He paused, in case she wanted to respond to that, but she didn’t. “What do you see out there?”

  “I was just wondering if she could have gone that way.” Her tone was back to being calm, as if she’d accepted his agreement and moved on immediately.

  “I thought of that, too. But too much time has gone by. The beach is too public for any one set of tracks to tell us anything. Too many dogs being walked, kids playing, people jogging.”

  “She liked the beach.” Her tone was soft, intense, as if she were puzzling her way toward something. “That’s why she insisted on this cottage, I think, instead of staying in the house. So she could feel more a part of it.”

  “You can tell this just by touching things. So you’re a psychometrist?”

  She shrugged. “If that’s what they call it. I don’t go around labeling myself. When I touch something, the experience is usually intense and realistic. I can get lost in the moment, the way a person does in a really gripping movie, but I stay myself.” She glanced at him. “I use cards, sometimes, too, for direction.”

  Cards? Like tarot? Never mind. He didn’t want to know any of these details. “Good call on the clothes thing.” Though God knows how he could use that information. Was this a kidnapping or something else? Could Christina have run away? Where? And with whom?

  “It helps to be a woman in another woman’s closet.”

  She smiled, and he realized he was standing far too close—close enough to smell some whiff of jasmine he supposed must be shampoo. Hmm. She had pretty hair. So soft that it made you want to brush it away from her face. Cup her chin. Raise her mouth to yours—

  Would you stop?

  He moved away. “If we’re done here, I think you wanted to have a look at the photos in the upstairs hall, right?” He hardly waited to hear her murmur of agreement before he hotfooted it back to the house.

  TESSA GAVE HER HEAD a shake as if to clear it, then brought her suitcase in, parked it next to the bed, closed the door of the cottage behind her and followed him across the lawn. He was a hard man to figure out. One minute antagonistic, one minute rational, the next minute hightailing it out of there as if his butt was on fire. And for what reason? She hadn’t said anything remotely offensive or scary—in fact, she’d made a considerable personal sacrifice to be civil.

  Men. No wonder the cards always said “not yet.” She should be grateful.

  There was no one in the hallway when she let herself into the house, but on the left, behind the oak slab of his office door, she heard Singleton’s muffled shouting in what sounded like a mixture of English and Mandarin. The sound followed her upstairs until it was lost at the turn where the hallway began.

  Griffin was standing about halfway along, looking the pictures over as if to find a suitable one for her to start with.

  “This is Christina’s mother.” He stood aside so she could look at the picture of the dark-haired woman on the sailboat. Her head was thrown back as she gripped one of the sheets, and she was laughing.

  “She’s very pretty. Christina looks like her.” The taupe jersey dress could have been made for a brown-eyed brunette.

  He glanced at her. “How did you—? Oh, in the cottage. The pictures in the mirror.”

  “No, I saw her before, remember? In my first vision.”

  “Right.” With a definite air of “I’m not touching that one,” he moved farther along the hallway. “Here’s a recent one.”
<
br />   Christina’s graduation picture. Slowly, Tessa raised her hand and touched the glass that covered the photograph. She waited for that shift in reality, that sense of the tangible world fading slightly, that would tell her she could read something from the picture, but nothing happened.

  He was standing too close. She moved casually down the row of photographs, moving backward in time until it ended with a ponytailed cherub in first grade. Still, no matter how often she moved, there he was, right beside her. In the deserted hall, she became increasingly aware of the power of him, of the sense that he was at ease in his own body despite the slight hitch in his stride.

  “Anything?” Griffin asked.

  “No.” She cleared her throat. “Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. You never know until you try.”

  “So that’s what you want me to report to Jay? That it didn’t work?”

  Tessa looked at him, a little surprised. “I didn’t promise that it would. We did pretty well for my first day here. We know she was trying to impress someone. We have one possibility—that the someone and the kidnapper are the same person.” She paused. “At this point in any good mystery, the cop goes off and compiles a list of all the victim’s known associates to see if anyone fits either profile.”

  “Already done.” Griffin’s tone was flat. “Unfortunately, because Jay is so set on secrecy, we can’t call anyone to see if they know anything. And before you ask—” he held up a hand “—she didn’t keep a diary or a calendar. That would be way too organized.”

  Okay, so maybe it was a mistake expecting a real cop to behave like the ones in books. But did he have to be quite so negative? Not to mention so tall and distracting? And did he have to give off this sense that he was waiting for something to happen? What?

  She took refuge in speculation—stream-of-consciousness chatter that would put words, if nothing else, between them. “Surely her dad knows one or two of her friends well enough to ask them to keep it quiet. Maybe Christina confided in them about who she wanted to impress when they were shopping.”

  “Right, and teenage girls are going to tell an authority figure anything? Or do what he asks them?”

  “Probably not.” Then an idea struck her. “But they might tell me.”

  “Tell you what?”

  At the sound of the woman’s voice on the landing, both of them turned. “Hey, Mandy,” Griffin said, and the atmosphere of anticipation dissipated. “You haven’t met Tessa Nichols yet, have you?”

  The blonde held out a hand and looked Tessa in the eye. “Not yet. I figured Jay was enough for anyone to start with. Nice to meet you, Tessa.”

  The woman’s grip was warm and firm and her self-control was admirable. But the worry was there in her eyes and in the tight grip of her hand.

  “We’ll find her,” Tessa said quietly. “We’ve already made some progress.”

  Griffin looked from one to the other, obviously a little confused at what must look like a sudden change in subject.

  “You get right to the point, don’t you? What kind of progress?” Mandy asked. Her clear gaze never left Tessa’s face. She tugged, and Tessa released her hand.

  Griffin outlined what little they had, and ended by saying, “This is just guesswork, Mandy. I’d rather have something concrete to tell you.”

  “We don’t have anything concrete,” she reminded him, and led the way back out to the landing. “That’s why Tessa is working with us. I’ll take whatever we can get, personally. Are you going to tell Jay?”

  “He wants reports.”

  “Hourly?”

  “Almost.”

  “Oh, good. You can give them to me hourly.” She grinned at him as though they’d been best friends for years.

  Maybe they had. But there was nothing sexual in their camaraderie. The impression that had flashed in Tessa’s mind during their handshake—under the fear—had been one of clarity and warmth. This woman had it all—married to one of the ten richest men in the country, a house in Carmel, a face and figure to die for—and a loving heart to boot. Tessa devoutly hoped that Jay knew how lucky he was.

  “Mandy, do you think Jay could call some of Christina’s friends?”

  She lifted an eyebrow. “Are you kidding? He doesn’t even know who the neighbors are, much less who his daughter hangs out with. Why? Do you think one of them might know something?”

  “It’s possible she might have let something slip,” Tessa explained. “Some clue about anyone new she might have met lately—because obviously it wasn’t in a family situation—or what plans she might have had.”

  “She likes two of the girls at Pebble Beach. I play tennis with the mother of one of them. But there’s a problem.”

  “What’s that?” Griffin asked.

  “Jay has told me he wants this kept quiet. With the media gathering for the PGA event this weekend, I think the risk is too great if we started calling around and people put two and two together.”

  A muscle flexed in Griffin’s jaw. “Can you get around it somehow? Find out without them figuring out why you want to know?”

  “Oh, right,” Mandy scoffed. “Slide a lie about her friend past a teenager? That’ll be a huge success.”

  “So bottom line, we’re on our own,” he said grimly. “He’s got my hands tied from every direction. How am I supposed to find her if he closes off every road I try to take?”

  “Think of it from his side,” Mandy said. “He’s spent the last ten years since his breakup with Barbara trying to get more than alternate holidays with his kid. Now that Christina’s old enough to choose him, he’s not going to do anything to jeopardize the status quo with Barbara.” She lowered her voice, and Griffin and Tessa both leaned closer. “Because, you see, if she gets her degree out here and not Boston, she makes her networks and connections here. That makes her more likely to get a job here, meet someone, and make a life on his side of the country. See where I’m going with this?”

  Griffin straightened. “Please tell me Jay isn’t screwing up my investigation so that he’ll be in the same state as his future grandchildren.” His tone said, Just shoot me now.

  “You know Jay.” Mandy smiled at him, but behind the smile was understanding and the shadow of her own fear. “Always thinking in the long term.”

  “I’ll do everything I can to help,” Tessa said into the silence.

  “I know you will.” Mandy nodded. “But in the meantime, I came to find you for a reason. Dinner is at six in the dining room.” She waved into the echoing space of the entry hall below them, in the direction of a door on the far side. “Right there, in case Griffin hasn’t given you the entire tour.”

  Six. An hour away. “If you guys have other things to do, I’ll just wander around and look at pictures. You never know what might spark something.”

  “Then I guess I’m wandering with you,” Griffin said.

  So much for subtle hints.

  Mandy clattered down the stairs and left her alone again with Griffin. As he stood next to her, she could smell the freshly laundered cotton of his T-shirt and the faint scent of coffee. His thumbs were hooked loosely in his front pockets, his long fingers resting lightly on worn denim. The pose masked any tension he might be feeling, instead projecting a kind of casual masculinity that drew the eye right between his hands.

  She would not look at his button-fly Levi’s. So what if his hips were lean and his legs long and rangy. He was an ex-cop, and cops had fallen off the bottom of her list long ago.

  She tried to concentrate on the pictures in the second hallway, which, from the look of the bedrooms, was where the family slept. Here the pictures were a mix of family events, where Mandy’s smile was most evident, business successes, and holidays in places where there were palm trees or endless slopes of snow. Some of the photographs even featured Griffin in the background.

  The man whose body heat she could feel against her bare arm at this moment, whose gaze felt the way his hand might if it were memorizing the contours of he
r body.

  Oh, come on. Your imagination is running away with you. You cannot feel a man’s gaze.

  Maybe most people couldn’t, but she could. Right now. If he didn’t stop looking at her breasts she was going to cross her arms, and that would make her look defensive and prudish, and that would seriously annoy her.

  You’re imagining it because he’s standing so close.

  Was he trying to intimidate her? If so, he was going to fail. It was perfectly clear that she and her talent were all he had to work with, so that put her in control—a feeling so unusual that she was going to enjoy the novelty of it for all it was worth.

  No matter where he happened to be looking. In fact, let him look. He could look, but he couldn’t touch. She straightened her shoulders and sensed more than saw him rocking back on his heels. Ha.

  She stopped in front of a picture that looked as though it had been taken at a Christmas costume party. The internal sensor she had learned to trust over the years went, What’s this?

  “That was taken here at the house last Christmas,” Griffin said in the carefully resigned tone of a tour guide. “There’s a ballroom downstairs, on the ocean side.”

  There were a number of costumed people in the photo, including Jay Singleton as Santa and his daughter as something in a diaphanous dress with silvery wings. A sugarplum fairy, maybe? Singleton had his arms around a couple of guys in Roman togas, while a third guy raised a tall glass in a toast. Tessa could only imagine how romantic a winter dance in such a beautiful setting might be, with French doors opening on the terrace and the sea crashing in the background. Ah, the life of the rich and famous.

  On the down side, these people had their kids stolen. Given the option, she would rather be a nobody and safe in student housing than the daughter of one of the ten richest men in the country, tied up on a bed with scarves.

  7

  From the private journal of Jay Singleton